Land and Pitch their Tents--Place of Landing--Cultivate the
Ground--Good Crops--Find Animals of Every Kind--Also Ores--Raise Large
Flocks and Herds--"Carneros de la Tierra"--Find the Horse--Was the
Horse Extinct When the Whites Discovered America?--Reasons for
Thinking it was not--Wild Horses Seen by Sir Francis Drake in
1579--Opinion of Professor Marsh--Horses Seen by Drake, not Spanish.
They landed and pitched their tents, and they acknowledged that the
Lord had indeed fulfilled His promises unto them. He had guided them
through the wilderness, had enabled them to construct a vessel, in
which He had brought them safely across the mighty breadth of ocean
which extended from the coast of Arabia to the coast of what is now
called South America, or as they, with good reason, called it, "The
Promised Land." The Prophet Joseph, in speaking of their place of
landing, said [A] it was on the coast of the country now known as
Chili--a country which possesses a genial, temperate and healthy
climate. They immediately turned their attention to agriculture. They
prepared the ground and put in all the seeds which they had brought
with them from the land of Jerusalem. They found the soil admirably
adapted for agriculture. Their seeds grew finely and yielded good
crops, and they were blessed with abundance. We find no mention made
of any seeds being planted by them at any point from the time of their
departure from Jerusalem until they reached the promised land. If
while encamped in the valley of Lemuel or at Bountiful they cultivated
the earth and raised provisions or seeds, we are not informed of it,
though doubtless both places were suitable for that purpose.
[Footnote A: They traveled nearly a south, southeast direction until
they came to the nineteenth degree of north latitude; then, nearly
east to the sea of Arabia, then sailed in a southeast direction, and
landed on the continent of South America, in Chili, thirty degrees
south latitude.]
In exploring the wilderness after their arrival they found animals of
every kind--the cow, the ox, the ass and the horse, the goat and the
wild goat, and all manner of wild animals which were for the use of
man; they also found ores of all kinds, particularly gold, silver and
copper. The animals they tamed for their use, and Nephi and his people
raised large flocks and herds of animals of every kind. Doubtless they
raised herds of a species of camel which is native to the northern
part of Chili and to Peru. The Spaniards call them _carneros de la
tierra_. These animals in many respects resemble the camel of the old
continent; but differ materially in others. They are less in size, but
of a more elegant form; they have a small head without horns, but a
large tuft of hair adorns the forehead; a very long, slender neck,
well proportioned ears, large, round, full, black eyes, a short
muzzle, the upper lip more or less cleft; the body is handsomely
turned, the legs long and slender, the feet bipartite, or divided in
the hoof like the deer and the sheep; the covering of the body is a
mixture of hair and wool. The varieties of these animals are the
llama, pace, or alpaco, guanaco and vicuna or vicugna. The size of a
full-grown llama is five feet five inches from the bottom of the foot
to the top of the shoulders. It is by far the handsomest and most
majestic animal of the four. The wool is coarse but so abundant on the
body that they carry loads on their backs without pack-saddles.
Travelers say that nothing can exceed the beauty of a drove of these
animals, as they march along with their cargoes on their backs, each
being about a hundred pounds weight, following each other in the most
orderly manner, equal to a file of soldiers, headed by one with a
tastefully embroidered halter on his head, covered with small bells,
and a small streamer on his head. Thus they cross the snow-covered
tops of the mountains or defile along their sides. Many parts of the
routes over which they travel are not suitable for the service of
horses or even mules. Like the camel, the llama kneels to receive its
load; but if too heavily laden, it will refuse to rise until it is
lightened. Its wool can only be used for very ordinary purposes; but
that of the alpaco is manufactured into most beautiful blankets, which
are as soft as silk. Though the llama and the alpaca were domesticated
by the Lamanites before the arrival of the Spaniards in South America,
yet they and the guanaco and the vicuna have never mixed: the breeds
are distinct and will remain so.
Nephi informs us in his record that, among the other animals which
they found in the wilderness upon their arrival at the promised land,
was the horse. There have been persons who have declared that because
of this statement the record could not be true. They have used this as
an argument against the divine origin of the Book of Mormon; for, as
they have asserted, the horse was not known upon this continent until
it was brought here by the Spaniards. In this way they have tried to
prove the record to be false. But recent researches by scientific men
have demonstrated beyond the possibility of doubt that America is the
original home of the horse, and at certain periods it was occupied
with horses of many and various forms. Remains of the true horse as we
have it among us at the present time, have been found all over the
land. Professor O. C. Marsh, whose patient and intelligent
investigations have thrown a flood of light upon this subject, states
that the true horse at one time roamed over the whole of North and
South America. He believes that it became extinct before the discovery
of the continent by Europeans; but, he says, no satisfactory reason
for the extinction has yet been given. In fact, he acknowledges that
at present it is a mystery why the horse should have been selected for
extinction while other mammals no better adapted than it for the
surroundings, should have survived. He comments freely upon the
strangeness of its disappearance; for he is evidently convinced that
when the continent was discovered by Europeans it had disappeared, and
that we are indebted for our present horse to the old world, as Europe
is called. But we think it is by no means certain that there were no
horses on the continent when it was discovered by men from Europe.
Robert Dudley, Earl of Northumberland, published a book (_Arcano del
Mare_) in Florence, Italy, in 1630, (_1st edition, pp. 46, 47_) to
which Rev. Edward E. Hale referred in a paper read by him before the
American Antiquarian Society (_Proceedings, October, 1873, p. 93_) in
which he states that Sir Francis Drake [B] found many wild horses on
the west coast of North America, at which he wondered, because the
Spaniards had never found horses in America. Mr. Hale said:
[Footnote B: Sir Francis Drake was engaged in his celebrated voyage
round the world. His fleet consisted of three vessels--the _Pelican_,
of one hundred tons, the _Elizabeth_ and the _Marigold_, each of
eighty. He entered the Pacific Ocean from the straits of Magellan, on
the 6th of September, 1578. On the 30th he lost sight of the
_Marigold_ in a gale, and never saw her again. On the 16th of April,
1579, he left the port of Guatulco, on the Mexican coast, and having
sailed west and afterwards north, he ran as far north as the parallel
of 43°, or, according to other accounts, of 48° north latitude.
Bryant, in his Popular History of the United States, (_vol. 2, p.
577_) says that Humboldt evidently thought that Drake sailed that far
north (_see Humboldt's "New Spain," ii. 337 et seg._) as this latitude
corresponds best of all with the severe cold. Opinions vary as to
whether the port which Drake called New Albion was the bay of San
Francisco or not; but the evidence is that it was.]
"The Atlas in the Arcano contains thirty-three maps of America. My
notes on the Munich Atlas show that that contains forty-six maps in
manuscript. After the engraved map, No. 33, the reference to Drake and
the coldness of Oregon is in the following words:
"'As the extract from Dudley referred to by Mr. Hale is in Italian, we
give the translation:
"'This map is the last of the sixth book which [map] begins with the
port of New Albion [Nuovo Albion]--longitude 237° and latitude
38°--discovered by the Englishman, Drake, about 1579, as [said] above,
a place favorable for taking in water and getting other necessaries.
The said Drake found that the savages of the country were very
courteous and kind, and the land pretty fruitful, and the air
temperate. He saw rabbits in great numbers, but with tails as long as
[those of] rats, and [saw] _many wild horses, with the more wonder
because the Spaniards never saw horses in America (e [vidde] di molti
cavalli saluatichi, con maggiore maraviglia, atteso chegli pagnuoli
non viddero mai cavalli nell' America);_) and the reason that Drake
sought and found the said port was this,--that having passed the true
cape Mendozino,--latitude 42° 30'--to take water, at 43° 30' north
latitude he found the coast so cold in the month of June, that his
crew could not bear it; at which he quite wondered, the latitude being
about the same as that of Tuscany, and of Rome in Italy.'"
In a conversation with Professor Marsh, at Washington, in the winter
of 1881, we called his attention to this statement of Dudley's. He had
heard of it; but, possessed of the belief that the horse was extinct
when Europeans came to this continent, he was not inclined to accept
Dudley's statement as true. Yet, aside from the wide-spread and
generally accepted belief that there were no horses on the continent
at the time of its discovery, there is no evidence which has come to
the knowledge of paleontologists or naturalists to prove that the
horse was not here at that time. The evidence of its existence up to a
comparatively recent period are abundant all over the continent, and
wonder is expressed by investigators that it should have disappeared.
But did it disappear? Six hundred years before the advent of the
Savior, Lehi and his company found the horse in South America. There
is no reason to doubt that it was preserved by his descendants up to
the time of the extinction of the Nephites, early in the fifth century
of our era. It is customary to account for the immense herds of
American horses on the assumption that the Spaniards introduced them.
But if Drake and his companions saw these horses as described by
Dudley, they could not have been descendants of Spanish horses; for no
Spaniards had penetrated that country or been within hundreds of miles
of it at the time of its discovery by Drake, in 1579. Viceroy Mendoza,
who succeeded Cortez, by appointment of the Emperor Charles, in the
civil administration of the Spanish possessions, Cortez being
restricted to his duties as military commander, sent out Vasquez de
Coronado to find the seven cities of Cibola, of the wealth of which
the Spaniards had heard very wonderful stories. As early as 1540 he
penetrated the country as far as the territory now known as New Mexico
and probably into Arizona. He and his troop had horses; but even if
they had lost or turned loose any, it is most improbable that in
thirty-nine years they would have multiplied into large herds observed
by Drake on the sea-board, which as we know was at least five hundred
miles away. Coronado had but few horses, would have had fewer brood
mares, and would have been apt to mention any loss of a large number
of auxiliaries so essential to his expedition. Dudley published his
work in Italy, where he was residing, in, 1630. He was a navigator
himself, and was the son-in-law of Cavendish, one of the explorers of
the South seas. He was well acquainted with the survivors of Drake's
voyages. His description of the wild horses they saw has nothing
improbable about it; for until quite recently wild horses roamed in
herds over all that country. At the time we settled in this Territory
wild horses in California were very numerous. And we see no reasons to
doubt the correctness of Dudley's statement that Drake saw them in
great numbers when he visited the coast in 1579.